Elemental Computinghttp://elementalcomputing.ca
enMicro Business IT Concernshttp://elementalcomputing.ca/micro-business-it-concerns
<div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>I was having a conversation at an event last night and was briefly asked by a solopreneur about what they should be concerned about with their computer. My comment was that when I talk to a microbusiness or solopreneur (usually 1-3 employees including the owner) that my largest concern is over the protection of company data from catastrophic loss.
</p><ul><li>I frequently find that most entrepreneurs don't have a 'real' backup of their data at all.</li>
<li>They have most materials stored on their laptop or desktop or spread across both.</li>
<li>They have often copied some of their data onto an external hard drive or a usb stick.</li>
<li>They haven't comprehensively reviewed what data they need to save and have likely missed important items.</li>
<li>Those external drives or usb sticks are only used occasionally and not regularly verified (Murphy says when they are needed they will have died in the meantime).</li>
<li>Those external drives or usb sticks are also often stored in the same location as the computer - meaning they will be stolen with the laptop since they are in the same bag, or burned down with the computer since they are still in the same room.</li>
</ul><p> The biggest challenge that I feel most entrepreneurs have with this is:
</p><ol><li>They aren't IT specialists and don't know what the approach should be.</li>
<li>They don't have the time to assess and find the tools they need.</li>
<li>Most entrepreneurs have a manual process that consumes time and that time is often consumed by other tasks.</li>
</ol><p> </p>
</div></div></div>Wed, 19 Mar 2014 20:19:29 +0000ElemAdmin24 at http://elementalcomputing.cahttp://elementalcomputing.ca/micro-business-it-concerns#commentsRouters for Home/Small Business Networkshttp://elementalcomputing.ca/routers-homesmall-business-networks
<div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>It is clear that the capabilities of various routers have not been clearly communicated to the business owners and home owners that require these devices. As a result, consumer grade routers are being pressed into service in situations beyond their capabilities.</p>
<p><strong>What are their capabilities?</strong></p>
<p>Excellent question, since the advertising doesn’t spell out their limitations. However, Linksys has started a rating system for their router devices.</p>
<p> </p>
<p align="center"><img alt="Linksys Rating System" src="http://www.elementalcomputing.ca/sites/default/files/pictures/Linksysrating.jpg" style="width: 440px; height: 386px;" /></p>
<p><!--break--></p>
<p>Basically, the two limitations of a Router/Wireless Access Point Device are:</p>
<ul><li>the number of connections or devices it can provide data to without being overwhelmed;</li>
<li>the distance that it can reliably communicate wirelessly</li>
</ul><p>In general, the more expensive the device, the faster and more robust the internal components are and the more data it can process in the same time period. This means that it can handle more connections and more computers. The more expensive devices also tend to have better wireless equipment and a longer internal antenna, which means you will have signal further away.</p>
<p>Looking at the Linksys chart above, we will note that on the left side we have house pictures getting increasingly larger – this is the wireless range. Across the top we have a listing for the number of devices that you have in your network.</p>
<p>Remember, this isn’t counting computers, it’s counting <strong><u>devices</u></strong>. So, the Xbox counts, your smartphone counts (if you are using it on your Wi-Fi network), as does a media box for streaming movies, wireless security cameras, et cetera.</p>
<p><strong>So, what does this mean? </strong></p>
<p>If you have a router that isn’t up to the task of handling the number of devices that you need on your network, then you will have excessive slowness, intermittent loss of connectivity across multiple devices, and constant inexplicable problems.</p>
<p><strong>What should I buy?</strong></p>
<p>Using Linksys charting and products:</p>
<ul><li>A-class router starts at about $50.00*</li>
<li>B-class router starts at about $90.00*</li>
<li>C-class router starts at about $130.00*</li>
<li>D-class router starts at about $160.00*</li>
</ul><p>* These prices are CAD, from Future Shop at the time this was written.</p>
<p>I suggest this as a good guideline for those looking to ensure their router can provide the capabilities that they require.</p>
<p>If you don’t want to use Linksys, instead preferring to look at Netgear, d-link, Asus or other router, I suggest you try to stay within the comparative price range for those devices and you should find equivalent hardware.</p>
<p><strong>Anything else to consider?</strong></p>
<p>Finally, I would like to note that the expectations on the Linksys chart above are for HOME users where not all devices are being used all the time.</p>
<p>If you are running a business and you have 7 people working on devices all day, you are going to be pushing any consumer router to its limits. If you have 10 or more people, you are probably losing time and frustration to a badly performing network. If you are in this situation, you need to start looking at professional devices to manage your network. The time and business lost due to slowness and problems using a consumer router will pay for a professional level product in no time at all. My preferences for the low end professional products are the Cisco ASA 5505 and the Meraki MX 60 router depending on your licensing preferences. </p>
</div></div></div>Fri, 10 May 2013 20:21:35 +0000ElemAdmin22 at http://elementalcomputing.cahttp://elementalcomputing.ca/routers-homesmall-business-networks#commentsWebsite Updateshttp://elementalcomputing.ca/website-updates
<div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>Elemental Computing Websites have undergone a routine update and reset as it was necessary to move server hosting to our own web host. Content is unchanged though.</p>
</div></div></div>Wed, 26 Sep 2012 16:44:48 +0000ElemAdmin16 at http://elementalcomputing.cahttp://elementalcomputing.ca/website-updates#commentsInstalling VPN Server onto Debian 2.6.26 Serverhttp://elementalcomputing.ca/installing-vpn-server-debian-2626-server
<div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>One of my clients wanted access to my test server that I use for web design mockups. This test server allows me to serve the sites from apache and have a mysql database backend for CMS systems etc. My test server runs the Debian distribution of Gnu/Linux with a kernel version of 2.6.26.<br /><br />I decided that I could allow this client access, but I didn't want to expose my server to the outside world, therefore I needed to let this client into my network. For a variety of reasons, I felt that setting up a VPN into my network was the way to go in this case.<br /><br />So, off to the internet to find out how to do this. I initially found a document entitled &lt;a href="<a href="http://poptop.sourceforge.net/dox/debian-howto.phtml">http://poptop.sourceforge.net/dox/debian-howto.phtml</a>"&gt; Debian pptpd how to&lt;/a&gt; and started reviewing the document. The first step &lt;code&gt; modprobe ppp-compress-18 &amp;&amp; echo success &lt;/code&gt;&lt;strong&gt;failed&lt;/strong&gt;<br /><br />More reading and a few more documents later, &lt;a href="<a href="http://pptpclient.sourceforge.net/howto-debian-build.phtml">http://pptpclient.sourceforge.net/howto-debian-build.phtml</a>"&gt;Debian mppe how to&lt;/a&gt;, &lt;a href="<a href="http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~owend/free/pptp-debian.html">http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~owend/free/pptp-debian.html</a>"&gt;Getting PPTPD to work on Debian GNU/Linux&lt;/a&gt; I confirm my suspicions about MPPE support. Since about kernel version 2.6.16 mppe support was included in the Debian kernel. The proper test would have been &lt;code&gt;modprobe ppp-mppe &amp;&amp; echo success&lt;/code&gt; which returns success appropriately.<br /><br />I was then able to apt-get the pptpd binaries successfully<br /><br />&lt;code&gt;<br />Pegasus:~# apt-get install pptpd<br />Reading package lists... Done<br />Building dependency tree<br />Pegasus:~# Reading package lists... Done<br />The following extra packages will be installed:<br />-bash: Reading: command not found<br />bcrelay libpcap0.8 ppp<br />Pegasus:~# Building dependency tree<br />bcrelay libpcap0.8 ppp pptpd<br />0 upgraded, 4 newly installed, 0 to remove and 142 not upgraded.<br />Pegasus:~# Reading state information... Done<br />After this operation, 1569kB of additional disk space will be used.<br />Do you want to continue [Y/n]? y<br />Pegasus:~# The following extra packages will be installed:<br />Selecting previously deselected package ppp.<br />Unpacking ppp (from .../ppp/ppp_2.4.4rel-10.1_i386.deb) ...<br />Removing any system startup links for /etc/init.d/ppp ...<br />Processing triggers for man-db ...<br />Setting up libpcap0.8 (0.9.8-5) ...<br />Setting up ppp (2.4.4rel-10.1) ...<br />Setting up bcrelay (1.3.4-2.1) ...<br />Setting up pptpd (1.3.4-2.1) ...<br />Starting PPTP Daemon: pptpd.<br />&lt;/code&gt;<br /><br />So pptpd installed and running, let's modify /etc/pptpd.conf<br />I set my local ppp ip address and specified a range for the remote addresses. I also turned on bcrelay as the commentary within the file seemed to suggest that for remote windows clients.<br /><br />&lt;code&gt;<br />pptpd.conf<br /><br /># TAG: bcrelay &lt;if&gt;<br /># Turns on broadcast relay to clients from interface &lt;if&gt;<br />#<br />bcrelay eth1<br /><br /><br />localip 192.168.0.1<br />remoteip 192.168.0.100-150<br /># or<br />#localip 192.168.0.234-238,192.168.0.245<br />#remoteip 192.168.1.234-238,192.168.1.245<br />&lt;/code&gt;<br /><br />These are the only changes I made to pptpd. I then restarted pptpd to take the changes.<br />(addresses changed to protect the data)<br /><br />And that is it. Server installed.<br />Now I need to send instructions for the client to set up VPN and test.<br />I will let you know how it goes.<br /> </p>
</div></div></div>Tue, 25 Sep 2012 23:47:12 +0000ElemAdmin14 at http://elementalcomputing.cahttp://elementalcomputing.ca/installing-vpn-server-debian-2626-server#comments